


Our side

by moonlite



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: I Tried, I took it too far with no actual destination, Minor Beelzebub/Gabriel (Good Omens), No Dialogue, Other, This became longer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-27 23:07:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20054038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonlite/pseuds/moonlite
Summary: A mind dump of what might've happened during the war in heaven.





	Our side

**Author's Note:**

> It was supposed to be neutral but I got a bit sad towards the end and I had a good cry before I decided to stop.
> 
> Just have this fic and take it away from me.

The angels never forgot. They just can't talk about it - don’t talk about it. Aziraphale knew Crowley before the garden of Eden that's why only Crowley introduced himself. Since the angels don't really talk about the battle, demons assumed that they have forgotten about them; who they were before they fell and that created the most bitter kind of feeling inside. Fighting is one thing. Forgetting them completely is another.

No one can use their angel name in hell or anywhere so they need a new name. Using their angelic names causes them nausea, puking, or it leaves a bad taste in their mouth that lasts for days - or at least a very long time that is why most of them took a name near their real name instead. 

Crowley never really took a name for himself. Nowhere near his name nor anywhere near what he should be named. He never took interest since he wasn't supposed to be there initially. He only asked questions - is asking really too bad? 

Instead, he allowed the others to pick for him. Since he turned into a serpent, they just sort of bestowed 'Crawly' upon him and he went with that. He doesn't really want to ask questions down there anyway.

When the garden was made, he roamed it. He didn't really do anything downstairs to be fair. It wasn't like they were ready to torture him or make him suffer - he didn't technically need to be there. He's like an extra in the entire Hell cast so they asked him to go upstairs and stir some trouble; no specifics from the new bosses. Just 'stir some trouble'.

Roaming the garden entailed knowing the angels. Or at least recognizing who is doing what now that the garden is there and the distribution of task has been changed. North, West, and South gates were guarded by the most vicious angels he knew. He doesn't really know them personally but heaven is like a big office where you work with people and you know you all belong in the same company but you don't really talk to them. He tends to avoid them as he knows how they reacted to the entire battle. But it still helps to know who he'll be dealing with in the future.

The Eastern Gate is different though. This one is guarded by the most naive angel he has ever met: Aziraphale. He knew him when he was still an angel and Aziraphale has always been, well, angelic. He embodies it. He adored the life he was introduced to. He was a creature of pure love and joy.

He remembers when they were creating the stars in the heavens. Aziraphale was there to observe. He was there to look after the clouds but Crowley took a liking to his naturally inquisitive yet scared nature. He took him beside him and taught him how to make stars. They built them. Stars and nebulas and planets. Crowley remembers watching Aziraphale's eyes filled with wonder. They scattered light and played amongst them and they left a little signature. A little something to remind them that they made that together. A little souvenir.

He knew that Aziraphale didn't lose that flaming sword. He knew that it was given and the humans were aided in their little escape. He wasn't even surprised because it's Aziraphale. He knows it's bound to happen but he expected some...changes, perhaps. All the other angels became hostile with them, readying for a fight at the first sign of them - traitors, they were treated. So when he approached the angel and he didn't immediately become hostile, he himself became uncomfortable.

He challenged him. He knew Aziraphale was smart. That angel lead an entire platoon in heaven and he knows he can kill him should he really want to but they stood there having an idle chat. The angel even confided in him about his worries regarding the sword and really, instead of being worried about leaving himself vulnerable to the demon, he sheltered him with his wings from the first rain. (Having an enemy that close while in his most vulnerable was the most naive move yet, in Crowley's opinion. Imagine being so trusting that you let a demon that close to the root of your wings, defenseless. He could have broken that wing. He could have gotten his hands on it and leave him unconscious with pain. There was virtually nothing stopping him. All he had to do was reach. So why didn't he? Because - because he's Aziraphale.)

Aziraphale never really forgot. Not that he saw him during the battle but he was disappointed that he fell all the same. He's seen him roaming the gardens but he never really approached. He was scared but he knew him and he thought back to the times they created stars. He allowed himself a moment or two of imagining him an angel, roaming the gardens, teaching Aziraphale of the life within the walls. So when he stood beside him that day, he never really felt anything but disappointment. Disappointment that he fell. That he's a demon. That he somehow rebelled against heaven. Frustration that he could've stayed in his greatness. That on a good day like today they could've instead roamed the beautiful garden. That he would have taught him more. But he never resented him. Will never feel resentment to the angel who showed him how to create and how to destroy. And so when they talked, he was comforted. He heard a trace of the old archangel he knew and everything felt right in the world.

The years became interesting. History unfolded right in front of their eyes. They met in crossing points of their assignments and slowly traveled together. Somehow, their assignments keep on happening in the same place. 

Crowley is a demon now but Aziraphale found himself being open to his suggestions and even following him. Crowley is - was - his superior after all. He taught him - he was a teacher as much as a mentor and his suggestions are very important to him. He is - Crowley makes very good and vital suggestions and that is how they came up with their Arrangement. The Arrangement allowed things to be easier for them. They met to discuss the miracles and wiles and reported just that to their respective managements. 

The Arrangement also allowed them to meet. Here and there - not regularly but regular enough that Aziraphale secretly began looking forward to them. 

Unbeknownst to him, Crowley looked forward to them too.

They fell into a routine. Crowley would talk business, Aziraphale would take care of the leisure after. They drank alcohol and told stories - same old stories that they never got tired of. Often, Aziraphale wants to ask him how he fell. He knew he didn't fight in that war - so how? What did he do that forced him out of heaven? But of course that is not how this goes so he never asked. He never dared and he figured that if he wanted him to know, he'd tell him.

It was after the Armageddon that wasn't that things began to change. Heaven became cold - well, colder than usual - and Hell went radio silent. Crowley knew Hastur would come after him one way or another for what happened to Ligur and that little stunt they pulled. He also knew for a fact that Aziraphale just became vital for Heaven. If an angel was able to survive the Hell Fire then that means he'll brave through a war with Hell. He might even be asked to fight alongside Michael or made into an archangel. Beelzebub would surely put him on off-limits list. If Beel knows what is good for demons.

Well look at that. They just became important weapons. 

But are they willing to be that? Be weapons against each other? Because that is the only logical assumption at this point. The wild cards pitted against each other in a fight. 

Aziraphale never really thought beyond the now. The surprise of things unfolding in front of him has always been a delight. He likes watching and living in the moment so when Crowley came to him with a question one day, he couldn't find it in himself to answer.

"What if heaven promoted you and asked you to kill me?"

It was a perfectly acceptable concern. Heaven hasn't exactly been nice. Hell never was and it was like watching cheaters cheat against each other. It's not below Heaven to do that. But of course he doesn't want to think about it. It's unimaginable at this point. Can he really harm Crowley? Can he really... Kill him?

He can't even harm a hair on that demon's head. He was too dear too him. He was - Aziraphale never really answered Crowley and that made the demon uncomfortable.

Crowley would sometimes pace around his room thinking about this. They are on their side now, right? Them? Him and Aziraphale. Just them. The two of them. A team. As one. 

There was a time when he talked to Plato about that. The man was a good listener and he was pretty much in the mood to say a thing or two. In his defense, the ale was really good and potent. He 's told Plato about Aziraphale. About this angel he knows that is the other half to his whole. This man who can walk the earth and walk over him. This man who completes him. Every part of him. Plato was pretty smitten, he can tell, and was in the mood for realizations that night. When Plato made his symposium, he wasn't there. But he's pretty familiar where some of the ideas came from.

A few months later, Aziraphale decided to get back on Crowley about a topic they both thought they'd never talk about again.

"I am a principality, Crowley. I am an archangel with a different job and title,"

Crowley doesn't really know what to make of that but that means he doesn't have to imagine him fighting alongside the archangels. He fought with them. He just wasn't there to see it. 

He remarked that with a bit of bitterness.

"So, does it mean you will kill me if need be?"

"I could have, my dear boy, but I didn't. What does that tell you?"

Nothing, really. Just that maybe Aziraphale is a little stupid for not killing a demon in sight. Maybe a little naive for staying with him this long and even fighting with him. Being in their team.

"You are in our team, right?"

"What kind of question is that, Crowley?"

He doesn't know either.

Perhaps he isn't really afraid of death. Death is easy. Death is fair. Death is honorable and has a weird sense of humor and he likes those with weird sense of humor.

Perhaps it isn't the notion of death that scares him.

But the one who will give it to him.

Aziraphale. The angel poised above him, flaming sword in hand, pointing at his heart, just like the way Michael is depicted in pictures and statues. It isn't really a bad picture if you ask him. It's rather lovely. Aziraphale with his long blonde locks dancing in the wind, his voice the calm in his stormy death, his eyes - oh his eyes would be fiery. Full of life and energy, almost purple with the reflection of the blue sky and red blood.

He would rival Heaven's beauty. It would be a sin not to watch him in that moment. 

And Crowley, demon that he is, would not sin. No. He would watch him - every moment savoring Aziraphale's glory in his death. Defying Hell until the very last moment, admiring his beautiful angel; glimmering under heavenly lights, so powerful and strong. In his death he would be proud and he would be sure to pour all that he feels in his remaining moments, devoting his last breaths in singing Aziraphale's praises and love.

Death doesn't sound too bad after all.

Aziraphale fears death. Not because of the paper work of discorporation but because of its incomprehensibility. Death of an entity like them does not mean going to heaven or hell. A killed demon won't be going to heaven nor will he return to hell. He'll just cease to exist. Like they were never there. Like they were never made in the first place. They didn't have a soul that goes somewhere. Not to be confused with discorporation, death is often called 'extinction'. Where you cease to exist. Just like that. Death - in the human sense - guarantees a place to go to. A place to be judged, to belong, to be in. 

Extinction doesn't work that way and Aziraphale is scared of that. Scared of that for him and Crowley.

When he went to hell posing as Crowley, he wasn't sure what to expect of extinction. The holy water was involved so he assumed something like melting. Like when you pour hot water on ice cream and you see the trace of what the ice cream used to be.

The holy water was different. It disintegrated someone fully. And he thought 'This was to be Crowley's fate if we didn't change places' and never has he ever been glad to have done what he did. Just thinking about it gave him a sense of dread - a sinking in his stomach that he couldn't quite catch. Like feeling something lost but you don't know what and he hated it.

And so Aziraphale decided that death will not come to them even if he has to sacrifice heaven or hell.

He knew that God left a long time ago.

And maybe, God can sod off for it.

But perhaps, they have other matters to worry. More than death, more than God walking away. They have the earth to take care of now. They saved it and they can’t exactly expect both sides to still care after the ‘great plan’ not happening. Humans are useless to them. Perhaps their souls aren’t but what concerns happen here doesn’t bother them there.

It’s like watching children fight, getting Daddy’s attention - Oh look daddy I can do it better! Daddy like me best! - it’s almost dreadful what these children, capable of such power, can do. They can destroy worlds. They can destroy galaxies - the universe. It won’t be a human fight on earth. If Heaven and Hell decided to fight, they would destroy reality itself. Humans might call it a dream but it would be very real and very deadly. Their books are nowhere near the fight before the demons fell. Before their brothers fell and everyone decided that their fallen brothers are different and should be outcasted. Human words can never describe the casualty of that fight. They will never have a word for the moment angels both fell and died.

They can never understand the wave of pain, burying something you don’t even know how to describe. Burying a brother, a lover, a friend. Burying moments and memories and experience. Burying touches, and looks, and smiles, and laughter. Burying a fleeting gasp, a held breath - burying hesitation and trust. Burying light and grim and sparks. Burying all that you are, all that there is, coming out of a war.

Aziraphale likes to believe that he was hardened by it. That it has made him immune to pain and death. He lead a battalion of angels in a fight - they fought, they planned, they gained and lost. He has witnessed the worst that there is.

Perhaps he’s wrong. Perhaps he lasted that war because it had no meaning to him. He fought with the purpose of winning for his side. He had been a good soldier to please those who he might. Perhaps the war was just a war for him. He held nothing close, then. Held nothing too important. The only one he held secretly to his heart was nowhere to be seen and that gave him a glimmer of hope. Perhaps fighting in that war with that hope was what got him through. What saved his back when he thought he’d lost it. What he can’t see can’t be there and so he placed it in the back of his mind.

He would cry about it after. If there is anything to cry about.

When the war ended, he buried noone. As much as he looked, he found no one he must bury and that was the seed of joy in his heart. It meant something. Meant he hadn’t lost anything. Meant he succeeded and he was able to get out of it unscathed. 

No angel to bury.

No friend who died.

And for years in heaven he remained, following orders and pleasing other angels. He was going to get his reward, someday. He will see him. The war just ended and everyone is busy so he didn’t ask. Never asked. The war has taken its toll on everyone and he was more than happy for his gate duty. He can have his reprieve there. He can recuperate. And after that, he can be left on his own and do what he must. He can be free to look and search and see.

He survived with that in mind. 

He held on to that.

So imagine his surprise when the one he was looking for slithered around Eden, nosing at things that moved and things that didn’t. Crawling at boulders and laying under the heat of the sun.

Imagine what he felt when the light bounced right off his scales and gave a tantalizing glimmer, inviting him to come near and touch.

Imagine knowing someone for so long, so intimately, that in another form you recognized them and felt nothing in your chest but disappointment.

Imagine feeling. Just feeling. For the first time being assaulted by these emotions you hardly had during a big war. Being overwhelmed by everything you never paid attention to while you struck an enemy in the chest with a blade as holy as water.

He reminded himself he’s an angel then. 

An angel never felt.

So he didn’t feel.

But feelings aren’t solid and they spill. In his chest, one prevalent emotion escaped: disappointment. It’s a drop in his stomach that he can’t chase. A feeling of fleeting touch unknown. He was just disappointed and he didn’t know what to do with that despondence. Perhaps he can cry. The way Gabriel did when he had to bury his fledgelings; their mother had fallen and the fledgelings were burnt when their nest was attacked in darkness. He saw the wrath in his eyes consuming Gabriel to nothingness. He felt. He felt too much of the pain that he floated in it until he was one with it.

When his brothers had to kill their mates that they killed themselves after. 

The wail of the young ones watching the war, praying to God to please save them. Give them another day. Give them their life and let them return to safety and light.

God please keep them in your arms. Cradle them softly so that they may fall with no harm. Do not turn your back to them. Please, God. Please listen to your children call. Listen to their cries and pleas. Listen to them beg at your feet. Please God won’t you show mercy…

Aziraphale saw God walk out the room that day and not return. He saw but kept his faith. He saw but still believed.

His heart was safe somewhere. Until it wasn’t.

And it dropped to his feet and shattered and he was empty. For a very long time he felt empty. And then this emptiness was filled with sadness and dismay. He lived in that dismay until he didn’t. Until he forgave and tried to build himself up again.

Crowley holding his hand through it.

Crowley was there. He came for him when he needed him. He showed him the world when he refused to open his eyes. Crowley whispered to him the words he thought he’d never hear. He reached out for him when he felt detached from the world.

Crowley might have fallen but he got up to come back for him. Crowley returned to him. He saw what they lost when they fought in the war. Not everyone gets a second chance like this.

Crolwey’s memory of the war was vague. He didn’t fight in the front but stayed behind to care for the fledgelings. Angels and demons alike - he cared for them. He healed them. He helped them get back on their feet and fight. He knew it wasn’t just a matter of right and wrong. It was a matter of fear and losing. Or what is at stake and what could be taken. He understood that far better than he should and so he did what he can to make it disappear. To help who he can and heal.

And this act was seen as a betrayal and he didn’t help his case by arguing. By holding a fallen brother and defending their side.

Before he knew it he fell holding his brother in his arms, reaching towards heaven for help that didn’t come. He wept for the young ones left behind and the brother now in his arms bleeding - almost gone to death.

“Save them,” they cried. “Save them.”

“I can’t, brother. They were burned with the others,”

Crowley saw the last of golden tears in their eyes mix with blood. The life in it breathing anger into his heart. When it fell on the floor he knew that what he has in his arms isn’t a brother anymore but a warrior getting up to take their revenge. To fight and find justice for the lives lost. To eliminate the source of blame and blame no more.

To crawl back up and push down whoever should be punished for the lives lost.

The war wasn’t just about the sides. The war was about surviving and fighting until you know who to trust. Until you know you can trust.

And his mind wandered back to the angel he knows. The angel he knew would know him. The one he would trust over and over until he can’t.

Falling was painful not because of the burning.

Falling was painful because of losing everything you held in your heart.

An angel’s heart isn’t too different from a human’s. It beats and it thrums and it moans softly. It skips and it falls and it loves. It’s fragile and made of glass. Crolwey’s was cracked but he’s holding it up. Holding it all up until he can heal it. Until he can make amends and he can complete it.

When he saw Aziraphale in that garden he hoped. He hoped because he knew there was hope in him. He can fix it somehow. He can make it up. He can reach out to the angel he left behind because of what he fought for.

He should've fought just for him but he did what he had to do. What he needed to do.

When the angels became hostile towards the fallen, showing no recognition of who they were, they thought they had forgotten. They had forgotten somehow or chose to forget what happened. They figured: of course they would forget. Of course they would have the good life. They are angels. All they need to know is protect Heaven and everything outside it is an enemy. And so Hell grew grim and angry, lashing out. They remember the pain. They are suffering. How dare the angels forget.

Crowley knew it was unfair but he knew the angels deserved it. They cannot suffer for angels never should. Only their kind need to feel the pain for Hell is no place for grace and forgiveness. It was fair. Just fair.

And so he lived, leaving behind his duty, just existing, taking another character to mask what should be hidden. Following orders of stirring trouble upstairs since he doesn't have any role down there.

Knowing the angels guarding the gates, recognizing them, measuring what he should do should the need to defend himself arise - Crowley lived detached until the Eastern gate. Until Aziraphale.

And he knew and made a promise. He will make it up. He will do right by him. He will be there and he will not leave. Unless Aziraphale asked him to he will protect him and he will give his life for him. He will give his life to him.

Together, they will take this second chance. They fought in the war. It's behind them now. It's now time for them to start anew in this world they have helped make no matter what little they got. They are together. They can do anything.

The sun rises every morning after Armageddon that was not. Angels and demons working as they should. Crowley sitting next to Aziraphale in his shop, finally deciding to take up Aziraphale's offer of reading to him.

"You're on our side, right, angel?"

"I am on your side, my dear,"

"And I am yours,"

"Our side. Us. I like that,"

"Good. Because you're stuck with me,"

"And I wouldn't want anything else,"


End file.
